Food on a stick and other snacks at night.

One of the best parts about travelling to Asia are the snacks.  There are street vendors showing great entrepreneurial spirit selling all kinds of different foods in small, portable portions.  In the picture above, he is selling fish balls (curry and plain) and meatballs on a stick.   

This type of open-air restaurant is a dying breed in Hong Kong.  You can see the customer on the left adjusting the flame as he cooks his own dinner. 

On a street parallel to the famous night markets in Kowloon is a street filled with all kinds of restaurants.  Most of them are just kitchens and a place to wash dishes and the tables are set up in the street itself. 

Definitely not a 3-star Michelin experience, but a great casual atmosphere with good food that really hits the spot. 

   

With so many competitors, if your food isn’t good, you will fail rather quickly.  So it is a testament that so many of these places can stick around for a while and still offer very cheap prices.  In the picture on the upper right, there is a sign offering two different sizes of fried oyster cakes.  A small is large enough for two people to share, so I don’t even want to know how big a large is.  The oyster cake is made up of eggs, scallions, and freshly shucked oysters.  Similar to a egg foo yung, but a little lighter.  Very tasty and cheap ($20HK which is only $2.50US).  They also offered other varieties (chicken, pork, beef, and shrimp), but the oysters are what this place were known for.  It was very busy with just a ton of customers waiting for their orders, but it moves very quickly. 

This vendor was selling more fried snacks like chicken wings, seafood items, and vegetables. 

The King of Coconut was selling all kinds of juices and smoothies made with coconut milk or juice.  $4-6HK ($0.50-$0.75US) for most drinks.  Extremely refreshing and a great compliment to all of the fried snacks nearby. 

This restaurant had an outside station with these rice dishes cooking in clay pots.  It serves a couple of purposes to do it this way.  One, it keeps the heat outside so the kitchen doesn’t end up a complete oven.  Two, it is a form of advertising to potential customers.  The pots have different kinds of meats (pork, chicken, beef), some with vegetables or mushrooms.  They taste very good and are a type of comfort food, especially during colder weather.